The field of the invention is flashlights. More specifically, the invention relates to a portable hand held battery powered flashlight. For many years, flashlights have used batteries, specifically, dry cells, to power an incandescent bulb. Reflectors around or behind the bulb have been provided to help direct light from the bulb. More recently, with the development of light emitting diodes (LED's), in some flashlights the incandescent bulb has been replaced by an LED. Use of an LED in place of an incandescent bulb as a light source in a flashlight has several advantages. Initially, LED's use less power than incandescent bulbs. As a result, battery life in an LED flashlights can be greatly extended. In addition, LED's are manufactured with specific light emission directivity. Unlike an incandescent bulb, which radiates light in all directions, LED's emit light in specific directions, or within a specific angle. Accordingly, for spot illumination, which is the most common use for flashlights, the directivity of LED's is advantageous. LED's also have an operating life which is far longer than that of most incandescent bulbs. Consequently, the disadvantages of bulb burnout or failure, and the need to replace bulbs relatively frequently, are largely avoided.
While use of LED's in flashlights have several advantages, design challenges remain. In particular, the ability to achieve a uniform beam of light under a wide range of conditions has yet to be achieved with existing flashlights, regardless of whether the light source is an LED, an incandescent bulb or another light source. The directivity (included angle) of existing LEDs is not sufficiently narrow for lighting distant from the flashlight. Even with the most directional LEDs, having a directivity angle of about 15°, the emitted light becomes very faint more than a few feet away from the LED. For various reasons, the light beam of virtually all flashlights is not uniform. The intensity of light in the beam varies. Generally, this variation appears as lighter and darker areas of the beam. Some flashlights produce a beam having an irregular shape, and decreased lighting efficiency, rather than a nearly perfect circle of uniform light.
In the past, several flashlights, especially flashlights having incandescent bulbs, have included beam focusing features. In these types of flashlights, typically a reflector behind or surrounding the bulb is moved relative to the bulb, to change the light beam pattern or to focus the beam. While beam focusing is a useful feature in these types of flashlights, generally, the shape or uniformity of the beam changes as the beam is focused. These types of flashlights are unable to maintain uniform light beam quality over an entire range of focus. As a result, the light beam typically has dark spots and appears dimmer, and the quality of the light beam, in terms of field of illumination, is degraded.
Another drawback with battery powered flashlights is of course the limited life of batteries. While use of LED's can greatly extend battery life, the traditional drawbacks associated with batteries have not been fully overcome. Even with LED flashlights, prolonged use will drain the batteries. Most flashlights have an on/off switch as the only control. Accordingly, if the switch is inadvertently left on, the batteries will be drained. Thus, to maintain the flashlight in a useable condition, the user must remember to turn the flashlight off. While seemingly a simple step, it is often overlooked, especially where the flashlight is carried from a dark location into a bright location, where there are extensive distractions to the user, or where the flashlight is used by young children. To overcome this disadvantage, various flashlights having automatic shut off features have been proposed. However, few, if any of these proposals have found widespread success, either due to design, operation, manufacturing, cost and/or other reasons. In certain uses or circumstances, it is important that the automatic shut off feature be turned off entirely, so that the flashlight is switched on or off manually. This added requirement provides an additional engineering challenge in flashlight design.
Flashlights have been adapted for use in extreme environments. For example, diving or underwater flashlights have been designed to operate in an undersea environment of high water pressure, low temperature, corrosive seawater, etc. While these types of environmental flashlights have met with varying degrees of success, engineering challenges remain in providing a flashlight which can reliably withstand extreme pressures, high and low temperatures, corrosive environment, shock, vibration and other adverse environmental conditions.
Accordingly, it is an object of the invention to provide an improved flashlight.